SKOONHEID - BEAUTY (2011)

SKOONHEID - BEAUTY is a South African drama in English and subtitled Afrikaans. It concerns a middle-aged businessman who leads a secret life with a group of men who gather to have sex together. The man then develops an obsession with the law student son of a family friend. The film was classified '18' for strong real sex and sexual violence.

One scene shows a group of men having sex together. Oral and anal sex are implied but without strong detail. However, the scene also features brief sight of a pornographic video playing in the background, which the men are using to stimulate themselves. This video features images of unsimulated masturbation and anal penetration. The BBFC's Guidelines state that intervention at '18' is more likely 'where there are more explicit images of sexual activity which cannot be justified by context'. Such images will normally be confined to 'R18' in the case of 'sex works', that is to say works whose primary purpose is sexual arousal. It is clear that SKOONHEID - BEAUTY is a drama rather than a 'sex work', as defined by the Guidelines. Furthermore, the brief explicit images have contextual justification in exposing the hypocrisy of the men in question, who are homophobic in the outside world but who enjoy gay pornography and gay sex in private.

The film also contains a scene showing the attempted rape of one man by another. The scene is too sustained to be permissible at '15' where the Guidelines state 'any portrayal of sexual violence must be discreet and have a strong contextual justification'. However, the scene lacks any elements that might eroticise or endorse sexual violence, with the focus being on the painful ordeal of the victim. Therefore, the scene is allowable at '18'.